TC55DA tire spacing pictures!!

[Roto]

OK here it is. The TC55DA with 759C backhoe. I widened the tires out 2 inches each and here are some photo's.

The tractor

The view before widening

The view after widening

The wheel before and you can see the 2 inch spacer is visible and you cant tighten the nuts on the center plate this way.

The wheel after and you can tighten the center plate nuts now and can check them in future easily and it hides the 2 inch spacer for a cleaner look.

The rim before

The rim after

The tire gap before with no room for chains and can hardly open 3 pt. hitch arms without hitting tires.

The tire gap after which allows for chains and more room for 3pt hitch.

This is front view after widening showing the center of wheels now line up center to center.

This is what it would look like if you just swapped sides without changing center plate. I think this is position G or the 6th widest out of 7. It can go 2 more inches on each side. that would be a stable beast!! I just sat rims in place for picture purposes.

I set mine to setting C. You cant use A with R4 tires because it hits and B is the factory setting and I went with C which gives it 2 more inches on each side and a cleaner look and more room and more stable. Only thing bad is that Im like 6' 4" and if using 6 foot implements you may want to keep in narrow depending on what your doing.

Mike

 

[hazmat]

Nice photo essay. It's cheating to use the backhoe stabilizers as a jack

Are the tires loaded? Any trouble manhandling them around???

 

[Roto]

Thanks Hazmat you are the man. I was editting them and fixing it when all of a sudden before my eyes they were fixed and i was wondering what happened. Thanks!

Tires were not loaded and very easy to handle by myself.

Mike

 

[Diesel-ME]

Very helpful images Mike - thanks!!!

Hey - maybe you could help me convince my wife that I NEED a 759C backhoe in order to do this wheel work on my tractor....??

BTW, I almost can't wait for you to do a photo essay on the cool stuff that you will do with the hoe. (can we still say "hoe" in this family friendly forum w/o the FCC getting mad or something?)

~paul

 

[MadDogDriver]

Nice job Roto....thanks for the photo essay.

 

[Roto]

Paul, I knew you would like those pics. With 2 guys the loaded tires would be easy to move around. Need a good impact wrench because those inside center rim bolts are super tight and i had all i could do to loosen with my half-inch drive impact at 130psi. Had to put a pipe on a long handle ratchet for 2 of them.

Mike

 

[DieselMonk]

Nice pics! I want a 759C! my 757 looks smallish against that...

 

[Ford850]

Roto,
What is your tire spacing (center to center) now that you moved them?
Thanks.
Mark

 

[Roto]

56.6 inches instead of 52.79 from factory. Outside to ouside is now 75.46 and front center to center is 56.4 and un-changeable for reference.

Mike

 

[joes_427_vette]

Can't argue with all that documentation. My 55 feels like a narrowed rear axle with 22" mickey Thompson tires tucked under the fenders. Think will go with the 4" wider setting.
I had to remove the rear tires when I built the back hoe mounts. The left side was loose while the right side tires were torqued with a three foot cheater bar. I was surprised how light those huge tires were. I hope they are more than two ply in the sidewalls.

 

[Ford850]

Thanks for the details Roto. That setting looks nice on yours. I have a DX55 that just came in and the dealer is adding wheel wts, loader, rear remotes, etc. They needed to know where I wanted the wheels set, and I decided on 56 or 57" center width too, but I have R1's my overall width will be a couple inches narrower than yours.

 

[FULLPULL]

Nice pic's thank's Roto .I like the option of changing the wheel's also.

 

[meledward23]

Very Nice. I have a little different setting. My tires are approximately 80" outside to outside. The tractor used to be setup as your last photo, (tires reversed with no hub change), but the tractor wouldn't fit on a trailer unless it was deck over. So now at 80" it will fit on my equipment trailer with 2" to spare on each side.

Please excuse the mess, this tractor and I worked from sun up till sun down yesterday and we havent had the chance to clean up today.

Also, yes, a Backhoe is very nice for changing tires around. I couldn't imagine trying to do it any other way.

 

[schmism]

my buddy has a TC55 and he put 2 wheel weights on the inside up against the hub then used longer wheel bolts.

gave an offset that was between the normal and fully reverseing the rims.

 

[horse7]

I went through all the 'how wide to make the tire track'-- reading all the op mans and TBN threads etc., with the net result that I still didn't know everything I needed to know.

Originally wanted the tire tracks as wide as possible for stability. However, it is recommended that the outer tire sidewalls be less than the bucket width, so that sidewall damage opportunities are reduced (for instance, when pushing through rocky soil with the FEL bucket). So the rears are as wide as possible but still less than the bucket width, a bit of a compromise since the safest for the sidewalls is to be as narrow as possible. For the fronts, the loader op man recommends as wide as possible (for stability), the tractor op man recommends as narrow as possible (to reduce front axle asm stress, and therefore increase front end longevity). So the front is a compromise-- I went with the maximum allowed by the tractor op man for the FEL load.

The only item that was not clear, was the relation of the front and rear track widths. From discussion with various people, the main consideration is scrubbing of the front tires in tight turns, particularly on hard surfaces. More scrubbing, sooner replacement of the fronts. Depends on what you are planning to do with the tractor.

In the end, the rear and front centerlines will be essentially lined up, rears with a few inches of clearance inside the bucket cut width (81") on each side. This should also allow chains if necessary (from factory, literally no room between the 3pt sway bars and the tires-- maybe 1/8" to 3/16" to the rims!). [the rears are to be widened several inches in the next couple of weeks, not a whole lot after all the investigation I spent on this. But at least I have some idea of why I did what I did, and why the stalky highest stability rear tire arrangement isn't recommended with my FEL and box widths, for what I use the tractor for.]